


Amber

by starrystarrytrouble



Category: Open Heart (Visual Novels)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Boss/Employee Relationship, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, Late Night Conversations, Late at Night, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 03:40:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,050
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29586672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starrystarrytrouble/pseuds/starrystarrytrouble
Summary: Ethan tells MC how he feels about her after Harper joins the team.OH3 chap 1 added scene, Ethan’s POV. Set after the on-call room 30 diamond scene.
Relationships: Ethan Ramsey/Main Character (Open Heart)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 15





	Amber

Ethan liked lightning. The momentary flash that shattered the darkness and reminded him that even the best doctors couldn’t control nature. 

Tonight it matched the thundering of his heart. 

He couldn’t sleep. Which wasn’t a strange thing. A shot of scotch or a few pages of a good book could usually dull his nerves enough to slip him over the edge. 

But ever since Eve had broken through the last frayed gate that he’d half-heartedly put up so long ago, he fell asleep with ease. She was the warmth that cascaded over every inch of his skin near enough every night. She wore him out and gave him permission to rest.

As long as she was there. 

Now she was curved over his sheets, serene and graceful, delicate whispers of her breath against his shoulder, but he was awake. 

He wrestled with himself. The thought of getting up and leaving her wrenched at him. This was still unfamiliar enough that he didn’t take it for granted, he couldn’t, not when he still recalled every battle he’d fought with himself to get here. To have her close enough to touch. 

She rolled over as he eased his arm out from underneath her soft shoulders. As a lock of dark hair fell onto his hand, he traced his fingers over it, feeling a pang of regret as he brushed it off. 

Padding into the kitchen, he poured water, cold and crisp, into a glass and took a long swig. Something niggled at him all day, an instinctive discomfort that told him that something had changed between them, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. 

She was always the one puzzle he could never solve. 

He navigated each of their seasons with the same resolve. Whether they were keeping their distance or settling into their mentorship, he was constant. She came first and he would do whatever it took to protect her. Even if it was from herself. Even if it was from him.

But something changed earlier that day. There was a tension in her shoulders, tightness in her smile and a cautious look stung her beautiful eyes. For the first time, he didn’t know why. 

He took another sip of water, the icy temperature soothing every muscle as he swallowed, and slammed the tumbler down hard on the marble table. 

He deliberated over what could have changed her mood. The obvious thing was Harper joining the team. There was no reason that should be a problem, Eve had never once shown a scrap of jealousy or interest in his past with Harper. She respected Harper, he’d seen them joking together more than once. But maybe he’d become too comfortable too quickly and hadn’t considered the doubt that might still be running through her heart.

A shiver prickled over him, running from his shoulders to his throat.

He should’ve asked her. 

That’s what any sane man would’ve done, checked in with their girlfriend when their ex joined the team. Not made stupid flamenco jokes. The funny thing was, he’d stopped dating Harper when they went to that damn dance class, it was for Naveen’s birthday. 

He rubbed his forehead and the chill from the glass suspended his frustration.

He still wasn’t the best at handling a relationship, knew he never had been, but there was much more at stake in being with Eve. 

This was the last relationship he was ever going to have. 

Magnolia moonlight filtered in through the blinds against the sparkling Boston highways in the distance. He could drive, he thought, get in his sedan and ride to the edge of town. It was irrational and childish, but his first instinct was always to run. He knew he wouldn’t, not now and never again from Eve. 

She taught him that things that were hard were the most beautiful. 

Glancing away from the window with a small smile, he walked towards the bedroom. The soles of his feet on the plush carpet warmed each step as tendrils of sleep flickered over his tired mind.

So tired he didn’t realise that someone had turned a lamp on.

His breath hitched in his throat when he saw her. 

She was sitting on the edge of the bed, staring out through his balcony window onto the storm, dusky amber light illuminating her bare body. Her hair tumbled over her back in dark inky waves, her entire silhouette as enchanting and unfamiliar as the first night she’d stayed with him.

Ethan lent against the doorframe with a small smirk to drink in the view. Boston crowned with its most precious jewel in the centre. 

He wanted to keep her rooted to that spot forever and he wanted to feel his skin against hers right away. His mind only spoke in contradictions around Eve. 

Gazing down with darkened eyes, he noticed something in her palm. Her fingers tracing small circles over a dark orange stone.

His mind stumbled. 

It wasn’t anything, not really. A heavy chunk of amber, perfectly circular and smooth, with a small bug trapped in it. He’d had it for three decades at least, he still remembered holding it up to the light in the museum giftshop at the Harvard Museum of Natural History when he was 6 or 7. 

Cracking over its soft slopes, light bathed the gentle dusky oranges and flecked over the gold. 

It was fascinating. The idea that this tiny rock had been around for maybe 90 million years, older than mankind, maybe even older than the wind, was in his hand and his to hold, felt like a miracle to his young mind.

Alan bought it for him, he probably had an utterly awestruck puppy dog look that no father could deny. And it had remained with him since then. Heavy and solid, a touchstone and constant. 

He remembered holding it one of the first times Louise left. She wasn’t gone for long but as she stumbled out of the house after arguing with his Dad in semi-hushed tones, Ethan sat in his room in one corner, holding the stone up to the sunlight and watching it dance through it. 

If something so old could still be here, then he’d make it through. 

He ran his fingers over it time and time after that. When Louise left for good he clutched it for days reminding himself that she might be back. The first time he got a B in math he stared at the mosquito inside and refused to be trapped in Providence. On long nights writing his first book, it was a paperweight reminding him that all things come to an end, however difficult. 

He wasn’t sentimental. This was physics, as natural as the tilt of the earth’s axis. The same as lightning, a reminder that in this world there was very little he could control. 

So he would control what he could control. 

And as he watched Eve, playing with that same stone she must’ve picked up from his dresser, he realised this was something he could fix. 

His mind went to his hand in hers as they walked through the new Edenbrook as it opened. Everyone could see them, he knew they knew, but nothing mattered more than the soft press of her palm against his. 

His hand suddenly felt empty as he saw hers soothe circles into the amber. 

As she brought the stone up to her heart absent-mindedly, he wondered if she was thinking about him too. 

“Eve.” 

His voice was low and warm, careful not to startle her, but she must’ve known he was there, that sixth sense she’d developed years ago, knowing exactly where he was at all times. 

She smiled at him over her shoulder and he felt his breath catch in his chest again.

“Can’t sleep either?”

“Not when I can tell something’s wrong,” he said with a sigh.

“It’s nothing.”

She turned back to the window with a fixed gaze and shook her head softly. 

“Actually it’s not nothing. I’m thinking about how Edenbrook is different now with Bloom and the way the team… has changed.”

A name flashed over his mind. 

“Harper joining. Does that bother you?”

Eve sighed and cradled her arms closer, the amber still tucked into one hand, glittering pale gold in the dim lamplight.

“She’s an incredible doctor. You’re so in sync with her.”

“We work well together,” his lips curved into a small smirk as he added, “unlike June.”

Eve smiled and rolled her eyes. 

“I learnt a lot from June actually.”

“You’ll learn a lot from Harper too, we all will. Having her on the team is an excellent opportunity for us.”

“I know. I guess, I feel a little like I don’t know where I stand on the team anymore. Harper is a brilliant doctor and I’m still a resident. You’ve got years of experience between you, the way you bounce ideas, I feel like it’s my first day again.”

“I was trying to make her comfortable, Eve. Unlike you, it was her first day on the team.”

He regretted it the moment he said it. Her lashes lengthened as she looked down to her hands and uttered her next words as barely a whisper.

“I know that.”

“Harper knows how important you are to the team.”

“And how important am I?”

Her eyes flashed up to meet him, passion glistening. He didn’t miss a beat.

“Integral. And she knows how I feel about you. I think she knew before I even realised.”

Eve held his stare with the softest nod before breaking into a sultry smile.

“Maybe it would help if you told me a little bit more about these…feelings?” she said in a low whisper.

He shook his head with a smirk and ran his hand over her bare shoulder.

“I feel you’re… impossible. Infuriating. Downright distracting.”

“I think you mean funny, exciting and dazzling.”

“Difficult, argumentative and contradictory,” he muttered running his tongue against her neck. 

She gasped softly and lent into him as his hand moved over her chest. 

“Passionate, daring and analytical?”

“Like I said: impossible.”

His lips met hers with a gentle insistence and she moaned against him. It was different to their kisses in the on-call room earlier that night. As he parted her lips with his tongue, he felt her heart race next to his.

She bit her lip softly as they broke apart. Eyes darkened, he whispered into her ear.

“You’re also captivating. You’ll be a better doctor than I’ve ever been. And you’re breathtakingly beautiful.”

“Keep going.”

“You never give up no matter what happens. Not even on me.”

His gaze burned into her. Like the stone she was still holding, his brilliant blue eyes were flecked with gold as he whispered urgently.

“You know how much I care about you don’t you?”

She nodded slowly.

“I think I’m starting to.” 

For a moment he hesitated. A rare vulnerability tensed over him and he peeled the amber from Eve’s hands and looked down at it. 

Still warm from her small hands he basked in the thought of her holding something that had been with him for so long. If he’d had the courage to survive everything before this then he could be honest with her now.

“I’ll never want anyone but you Eve, I don’t think I ever have.”

She looked up at him with something new in her eyes. The one thing he’d been seeing more and more, the same thing that was reflected in his own.

He felt he could say it right then. If he was bolder, and more like her, the way she was looking at him, rich and calm and so full of care, he knew he’d hear her say it back. He felt the words rise through him and for a moment he was sure he’d utter them now or be damned forever.

But before he could, she pressed her lips softly onto his. 

She knew. 

The amber stone slid to the ground as he took her hand in its place and deepened the kiss.

All night he traced the three words into her skin, his lips mouthing them over and over against every inch of her body as he promised himself that soon, he’d be ready to give them breath.

**Author's Note:**

> If you made it this far, thank you for reading and welcome back to my rewrite trashcan. 
> 
> My MC respects Harper a lot and jealousy isn’t her thing so the only way I can explain the internal thought she had in the chapter was that she’s insecure about her role on the team. 
> 
> Also Ethan didn’t think about his feelings for Harper in this fic. They’re so mutually comfortable and platonic that she doesn’t even feature in his internal dialogue. 
> 
> \- Ruby / @starrystarrytrouble on Tumblr


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